The Manor & Hundred of Crondall

HUNDREDS

Until Tudor times counties were divided into administrative subdivisions called hundreds. The northeast corner of Hampshire was called the Hundred of Crondall. Jurisdiction of hundreds was supposed to be vested in the county's sheriff but many hundreds got into private hands. The Hundred of Crondall was identical with the

Manor of Crondall. In mediæval times the lord of the manor of Crondall was the Prior and monks of the old monastery at Winchester. King Edgar confirmed the original by bequest to the monastery by Bishop Ælfsige (d.958), and William the Conqueror did not disturb it.

HUNDRED COURTS

The Hundred of Crondall was thus administered in the Middle Ages by the bailiff of the Prior and monks of Winchester. Their court, called the View of Frankpledge, dealt with minor offences such as trespass, highway matters and the assizes of bread and ale.

MANORS & COPYHOLDINGS

The system of feudal landholdings was hierarchical. At the top of the pyramid the monarch ultimately owned all land throughout the country. Tenants-in-chief held land directly from the Crown. The Prior and monks of Winchester were tenants-in-chief, holding the Manor of Crondall from the King. Most tenants of the tenants-in-chief held their land by copyhold‘, so-called because the proof of their tenancy was a copy of the court roll written at the time they were admitted to the tenancy. Everyone who had a house, cottage, or just fields in what we now call Yateley, was a copyholder. In the early Middle Ages copyholders were obliged to supply the lord of the manor with part of their farm produce and provide labour services on the lord‘s own farm. Later these were gradually commuted to money payments.

DEMISE OF HUNDREDS AND THE MANORIAL SYSTEM

The hundred courts gradually lost their functions from Tudor times, and almost all their functions after the County Courts Act of 1867. The Manor of Crondall survived as the main means of transferring ownership of land until 1925.

The Mediaeval Parish of Yateley